Young Man Dreams of Architecture in Guatemala City Slum

I'm back in the U.S. this week, nose to the grindstone. But I can't shake it -- the sobering remembrance of these boys struggling to survive in "Paradise," Guatemala City's violent Zone 18. We, as part of @engadiministries, are working closely with 25 precious young men in this community, who are driven to get ahead despite the world of impossible obstacles in their way. Please let me introduce you to one more before it's back to "business as usual" on my feed. This is Juanes. He's 14 years old, but he has never been to school. For one thing, 72 percent of the slum's population had no access to education anyway. (Police don't event enter here after dark. In this fatherless culture, gangs appear to be the only obvious path into "adult" society, and the average recruit's lifespan is cut short at 24.) Juanes had a father. But he lost his dad to cirrhosis of the liver. Because of circumstances surrounding his birth, Juanes never received a birth certificate; so he was never allowed to enter school. As far as the world was concerned, it's as if he didn't exist. You should have seen Juanes' face light up when Nathan, Engadi's founder and director, was able to find an official form that confirms the boy's birth. Please pray for us as we work to order a birth certificate, cutting through a lot of red tape, so that Juanes can enter school and begin working toward his dream -- "to be an architect and build giant buildings," stronger than the shacks in Zone 18. In the meantime, he is in our Derek Program, learning to read and learning to take back his life! Looking forward to sharing more about this personal project in an upcoming issue of #ShutterMagazine and at our #WPPI and #ShutterFest classes. See you there, photographers! 📸 #Ocf #Nikon #D800 #sb900 bare bulb w/ #radiopopper triggers